


It Comes with the Wind

by thesunisloud



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Cannibalism, Cecil is Inhuman, Folklore, M/M, Native American Character(s), ghost story, horror story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-17
Updated: 2014-12-17
Packaged: 2018-03-01 21:28:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2788355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesunisloud/pseuds/thesunisloud
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What Cecil is, what Kevin is, and how it all ends.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It Comes with the Wind

 

 

 _Carlos_.

Carlos gasped and woke. He had been napping in the daytime, snuggled warm in blankets during a rare cold wave. Even indoors, it was freezing. The central heating system was a delicately folded paper replica of the  _C.S.S. Merrimack_. 

 _Carlos_ , the voice said again. 

Even for a scientist, the sound of his own name, called distantly and brightly, was enough to make his heart thud violently. He was certain he had heard it, clear as daylight. 

 _Carlos_.

It was unnatural and terrifying. Carlos stood and walked to the window. Actual snow, an entire half-centimeter of it, sparkled bright beneath the sun. It had been that way when he fell asleep, rare frozen desert white like shoveled stars. Rolling over the flat frozen sand wastes, between the abandoned streets, and through the ice-clear sheet of glass he stood before, the voice said again,

 _Carlos_.

He grabbed his winter lab coat, still insufficient in this sub-zero temperature, and went out into the snow and cold. Once outside, he discovered a strong wind, invisible in the solidly frozen world. It blew harsh against him, carrying his name on the voice.

 _Carlos_.

Still distant, more urgent. He had to find that voice. Carlos wrapped his arms around himself and walked quickly through the dead streets. Nobody was out in this weather; stores were not even open. Grocery deliveries had been balked by the icy roads, and for the last three days, the town had starved. 

 _Carlos_.

He rummaged in his pockets as he picked up speed, hoping for stray candy, finding nothing but wrappers. He was hungry and cold and alone. Cecil had not been in the apartment with him, not after the fight they had last night. 

 _Carlos_.

They had thrown things at each other. Never had they been physically violent, never had Carlos screamed like that or Cecil howled like that. Carlos could not even remember what the fight had been about, probably something stupid exacerbated by the hunger and the cold. Two lovers getting cabin fever stranded with each other in this lonely ice world. They had cursed at each other and thrown things at each other and ultimately Cecil had stormed out.

 _Carlos_.

This voice was not angry. This voice was happy. The wind curved in a smile. And yet, and yet, like him, it was cold. It was hungry. It was violent. The wind shifted behind him and Carlos began to run.

 _Carlos_.

Pain in his body, or maybe just fullness, lungs gorging on air and stride straining wide. Faster. Faster. The urgency only rose and rose. The wind helped him, pushing him along, allowing his footsteps to land further and further apart, toes barely even touching the flat ice coating of the sand wastes, until the wind finally wrapped around him and told him to stop.

"Carlos."

Panting, heart thudding, Carlos stared at the man who had called him. He was in front of him now, nude, bloody, familiar.

"Cecil?" Carlos asked. He gasped and took a step back.

The apparition before him grinned, a wide, gaping maw. Hollow black eyes stared like an abyss. Cecil's face was clear behind these marring features.

"Carlos," he said again, laughing, in that voice that sounded nothing like Cecil's. He raised his hands, in each fist a knife. The knives were covered in blood, and so was he. He licked sharpened teeth. "Come here, friend." Voice still high, bright, sunny. Wrong.

" _KEVIN!_ " Carlos gasped in sudden recognition. He took two steps backwards, then slipped and fell hard on the ice. He started to scramble back, tried to get his feet under him to run, but the next word made him freeze:

"Carlos."

It happened when it said his name. He could not rip himself away as long as this thing was calling his name. Its voice had power over him. Without his permission, his body sat at attention and his face turned to him alertly. 

"Carlos, I am  _so_ hungry! And cold. This violent winter is finally upon us!"

"Kevin. Please," Carlos said, voice vanished to a whisper. "Don't hurt me. I just want to go home. To Cecil."

"Violent, violent Carlos, so pretty in your anger," Kevin smiled. "Go home so you can Cecil can rip each other apart? I would love to see you two tear each other into chunks of fat and meat and eat your screaming fill. But *I* am hungry, Carlos. You will join me out here."

"No," Carlos sobbed. The emotions that had been deadened by the double's spell suddenly broke loose. "I can't let you kill me! I have to go back home and make things right! I can't leave Cecil like this! He'll-- he'll think I left him, because of the fight. I can't do that. I love him, I have to fix things, I have to make things right, I have to tell him I love him, I love him, I love him!"

" **CARLOS.** " 

All of Carlos' talking and motions stopped; it turned out he had managed to scrabble quite a few feet away. Kevin caught him with his bottomless black eyes, and his grin gaped huge as he bent to place a finger under Carlos' chin. Obeying the touch beneath his chin, he rose to his feet, where he stood still, eyes wide, panting rapidly and shallowly, while Kevin leaned close and smelled his hair. 

White light flashed off of knives in Carlos' peripheral vision. But what hit him first was Kevin's teeth in his cheek.

Carlos screamed; Kevin attacked him fully, and he fought. He was swiftly knocked down and pinned to the ice; twin blades rushed towards him and he let out another scream, full of uninhibited terror, sorrow, and regret.

Kevin jumped back as if startled. 

Carlos took the opportunity to kick his attacker fully off of him, then slipped and scrabbled on the ice as he tried to get his feet under him. He was about to engage all of his muscles to run when he heard, 

"Carlos?"

He froze. Not because of the hypnotic properties of the creature's voice, but because this voice was familiar. This voice did not belong to Kevin. This voice belonged to…

"Cecil?"

Carefully, Carlos turned. Cecil lay on the ice where Kevin had fallen, pushing himself up on his arms, naked and wide-eyed. Yes, those were Cecil's violet eyes, on the face where Kevin's black holes had once been. That was Cecil's surprised and frightened mouth, where Kevin's grin had once hung. 

Cecil's hands still clutched the knives.

"Cecil." Carlos shook and dropped to his knees in front of him. "Are… you okay?"

"Pretty much… Oh!" he cried, touching Carlos' face where he had been bitten. He saw the knife in his hand, and dropped it. "Carlos," Cecil said, and started to cry. "I'm so sorry."

"Cecil, I love you. You must know this. I love you. I forgive you, for… for whatever you may or may not have been in control of just now, and most especially for our fight yesterday, if you can forgive me. I love you." Carlos hugged him close, then let him go and said, "You have to tell me what you are."

"I'm a wendigo," Cecil said. "I-- I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I should have told you. I never thought it would come to this. I thought that by moving down to the desert, where the winter and famine never come, I would be safe…"

"So Kevin…?"

"Is me. My demon form. Most of us in Night Vale are afflicted with some manner of malicious spirit, and when they are not manifested through us, they dwell in a place floating beneath our reality called Desert Bluffs. We try to ignore that fact. We try to imagine our uncomfortable neighbor is a bunch of unfriendly strangers living down the highway. We all, all of us, like to imagine we're normal. Harmless."

"So. When it's cold, and you're starving…"

"I get violent. I turn into him. And I, oh Carlos, I swear I didn't know I was luring you, I… I swear I didn't want to attack you because of our fight, or because I d-don't love you…"

"Shh, I know, it's okay," Carlos said, holding him close. Cecil buried his face in his shoulder and sobbed. 

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry…" he keened constantly.

"Cecil, it's okay. I've been in Night Vale plenty long enough to know that sometimes, you're not in control of your own mind and actions. I just wish you'd told me sooner. You should know better than to keep secrets like that. Come on, let's get back, I'm sure I have a couple cans of food left, we'll eat it and snuggle under the covers and everything will be okay."

Cecil shook and cried harder. Carlos stood and hauled him to his feet. "Come _on_!" He put his lab coat around his naked shoulders, and began to pull him by the hand, then paused.

"Uh… which way is Night Vale?"  Carlos asked.

"You came here with the wind," Cecil said, managing to push his trained voice smoothly, if weakly, through the tears. "We're miles, literally miles in the wilderness. Only as a wendigo can I call the wind, and return. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry…"

"So…" Carlos said, the chill from within exceeding the chill from the freezing air.

"We're stranded here. If I manifest, I will attack and eat you. And if I do not manifest… we will freeze and starve out here, until finally, you become a wendigo too, and then we will eat each other."

"That-- that can't be true!" Carlos said, tears finally beginning to stake icy paths down his face. The wound on his cheek stung. "Cecil, there's a way back. We'll be FINE! We'll-- It's, it's only a few miles…" Already, the hunger in Carlos' belly leapt up with a roar, making his body shake with weakness, making his body shake with cold. Making his body shake with anger. 

"Carlos, we can't do it!"

"Yes, we can! There's a solution. You're just too stupid to think of it."

"I know my own curse! We're doomed!"

"We're not!" Carlos shouted. "You shut up! We're going to find food, and warmth!"

"We won't! There is none!"

"Shut UP!" Carlos howled, swinging at him. His fist connected solidly and he knocked Cecil to the ground. Cecil roared and leapt back at him, punching him in the stomach. Carlos opened his mouth wide with another howl, and sank his teeth into Cecil's shoulder, yanking back with a mouthful of flesh. Cecil let out an enraged howl in return, and leapt at him with a wide, gaping mouth full of sharp teeth.

Carlos bared his own fangs in return, furious, black hollow eyes raging into Cecil's, and there on the icy dead plane, they tore each other apart, ripping each other up and eating bloody chunks of each other until nothing was left but the howling wind. 

 


End file.
